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To the House Appropriations Committee, for killing study funds that would be crucial to the development of a refurbished thermonuclear bomb. The White House requested the study, but the committee is refusing to fund it, saying the B61-12 bomb would be “essentially a new nuclear weapon.”

The B61’s life-extension program is a key part of NATO’s nuclear strategy and is fundamental to our pledge to allies, given at a NATO meeting in June, to maintain this capability.

Without the upgrade, the B61 will have to be pulled from the U.S. nuclear stockpile, leaving the new F-35 Joint Strike Fighter without a bomb and the U.S. potentially unable to meet its NATO commitments. Unless and until we can achieve a nuclear-weapons free world, the U.S. must maintain a credible nuclear capability. Refurbishing the B61 is a crucial part of that strategy.